The Birds and the Bees
by QUeenVi3515
Summary: At thirteen, Integra is still clueless about sex.


The Birds and the Bees.

_He has not endowed the parts of woman with any pleasurable or satisfactory feeling until the same have been penetrated by the instrument of the male; and likewise the sexual organs of man know neither rest nor quietness until they have entered those of the female._

_Hence the mutual operation. There takes place between the two actors wrestling, intertwinings, a kind of animated conflict. Owing to the contact of the lower parts of the two bellies, the enjoyment soon comes to pass. The man is at work as with a pestle, while the woman seconds him by lascivious movements; finally comes the ejaculation._

_From the "The Perfumed Garden" by Sheikh Nefzawi_

A couple of months since her father's death, her uncle's failed attempt to usurp her legacy and her having made acquaintance with the creature from the dungeons; Integra started bleeding from that place between her legs. She is thirteen and though Integra knows such thing is bound to happen soon; she still feels uneasy about it.

Integra woke up feeling an uncomfortable slickness from her inner thighs. As she sat in the bathroom a few moments later, relieving herself with her knickers bunched around her ankles; a slight sense of dread came over her. The crotch of her underwear was drenched reddish-brown with blood; coppery and slightly foul-smelling. Feeling confused for a few seconds she nonetheless willed herself to calm down, taking several deep breaths,

Oh yes, she knew it's a natural process and it is expected of girls her age to go through it; and being female, she has to put up with it for many years to come.

Dr. Trevelyan told so in his lecture a year ago.

A minute or two pass and she stood up, taking care of her necessity with swift movements. Changing into a fresh pair of knickers she puts the bloodstained thing under running water by the sink. After quickly washing herself, Integra promptly left her room in her pyjamas and dressing gown in search for one of the maids in the mansion.

At thirteen, Integra is still clueless about sex.

Arthur Hellsing was a widower; that said he didn't give Integra the slightest idea about what a relationship between a man and a woman is about. Of course, Integra knows about marriage as she's seen glimpses of it, from magazines and the telly. To her a marriage is a ceremony wherein men usually wear tuxes and women don long white gowns with headdresses and veils as a pastor or priest read over them; after the ceremony the man and the woman becomes husband and wife.

Other than that, she practically knows nothing how a man and a woman who are living together as husband and wife would actually treat each other per se.

Try as she might, Integra could not remember how her mother was like.

Yes, she knows her name and how she looks like; this owing to whatever mementos of the woman she was able to scavenge in the cavernous attic of the mansion, photographs of a lovely woman with long black hair, caramel skin and dark eyes. Her mother is a stranger nonetheless and Arthur's refusal to neither discuss her nor say anything about her didn't made things any better.

It is in this muddled circumstance in her family life that Integra grew up with just Walter and her father by her side. Her father who always dressed in suits from Savile row even if most of his days are spent inside the mansion, shut off from the entire world. Aside from a few perfunctory dinners parties that were relatively business in nature; he rarely entertained and the great ballroom of the mansion smelled musty with disuse.

Despite the fact that Arthur was good to her, as good as a father could be; and loved her, as much as he was able to love somebody, for all of his virtues he was never affectionate and not once did Integra remember him tell her that he loves her.

Integra finds his father, even with all of his brooding as quite a handsome man, old as he was with his slicked-back gray hair and lined forehead. He looked especially handsome to her while smoking; a ridiculously expensive cigar dangling by the side of his lips, an expression of haughty nonchalance in his face.

He was tall and slender; his bearing every bit the aristocrat. Age had only managed to give his chiselled face with its aquiline features a more rugged look.

She wondered why he never remarried.

Being the homeschooled and sheltered young girl that she is; her interaction with men and boys alike is limited.

This is to exclude Walter and a couple of her father's contemporaries; men who are old enough to be her father or grandfather.

This is of course, discounting the presence of soldiers in her personal army; those sturdy men in uniform who she comes in contact only in the passing. An interaction made necessary as she stand beside Walter as the latter give the men her orders, being the young girl she is.

Her soldiers are males nevertheless, a fact not lost to her as she watch them whilst on their drills in the mansion's grounds; with her in the main veranda, putting a good distance between her person and the men…some are shirtless. Their muscles and sinews glistening with sweat from exertion.

Once when her father was still alive she asked: "Daddy where do babies come from?"

To which Arthur replied coolly: "Babies are borne from women my dear; women who have husbands."

Integra found his answer vague for it made her wonder about one of their laundrywomen, an unmarried one. How come did she have all those children when in fact she's never had a husband in the first place?

One afternoon a couple of days after Integra's twelfth birthday, more than a year ago; her father had sent for Dr. Trevelyan.

That afternoon Integra was mildly surprised when she found out that her father had invited the doctor over for tea for she just had a booster shot a couple of weeks ago and she certainly isn't feeling ill. An idea crossed her mind and she started to fear that his father might be unwell; his cough is indeed becoming more and more persistent lately.

However she felt puzzled when Arthur, after quickly consuming half a cup of tea had wordlessly left her alone with the doctor. Integra found the situation a bit awkward, at least for her. She made a few stilted attempts at pleasantries and civil conversation; the slightly timid twelve year old girl that she was. On the other hand the well-mannered doctor must've notice how ill at ease she was for he went swiftly to his tea, and after seeing that Integra had finished her carrot cake; he promptly and smoothly got to his business.

Clearing his throat a bit theatrically the doctor briefly mentioned about inconsequentials as Walter cleared the table before them. He remarked on her recent birthday, greeting her belatedly, he talked about Belgian chocolate truffles and complimented Integra's long ash-blond hair. After Walter left; the doctor began his lecture on biology.

A pamphlet in hand; Integra listened to him carefully as he told her about the changes she should expect to happen on her person to happen soon. She listened to the doctor as he bloodlessly and dispassionately talked about bodily processes which were still unknown to her up to that very moment. He talked about hair that growing on other parts of her body aside from her head; discounting the lightest down in her arms and legs. He told her about sweat glands and mammary glands; elaborating on the latter's purpose. Also, he briefly mentioned about some process called fertilization.

The doctor's lecture had a cold, sterile quality that is every bit scientific in manner and by the end of their conversation Integra's head felt like exploding with the strange and new concepts she's learned within a single hour.

She had thought that she'll be able to understand the things he discussed to her after an hour or two. Integra had thought that by that time the facts must've sink into her. She did jot down some notes and the doctor had given her pamphlets; they would help.

She thought wrong.

Her head was filled with new questions come dinner that night.

How do the man and wife make the baby? And how does the baby get into the woman?

Integra was about to ask her father about it at that very instant whilst they dine, but thought better of it as she looked at Arthur across the long mahogany table, over the sumptuous spread between them; her father looked more tired and distracted than usual. He caught her staring and asked her if there's anything wrong. Not waiting for Integra to answer his earlier question he promptly asked if she found Dr. Trevelyan's lecture educational.

She smiled and answered yes.

Weeks and months passed and a lot had happened since that day.

Her questions still remained unanswered.

Truth be told whatever knowledge she has about the facts of life, all have an ambiguous quality; none of her ideas are clear-cut for there are always the missing gaps.

No one would enlighten her about it; she knows she could not ask Walter about it. And if she could not ask Walter about it…

Integra is thirteen.

The questions plagued her and made her feel stupid.

While having her tea that afternoon, sitting on the same wrought iron set where she and doctor had tea more than a year ago she endeavoured to find the answers to her questions no matter how elusive they may be.

She felt a sudden warm gush of stickiness between her legs as she watch Walter pour water at the silver teapot. She gave a slight squirm in her seat, remembering the pad she'd put in her underwear that morning; she stopped not wanting it to get twisted out of shape.

Glancing at her, the butler asked her if she's okay.

Integra ignored him.

Integra acted that very night. She knows the manor's library by heart and somehow she has set her mind to start her quest on the books that are kept under lock and key on the oak and glass cabinet-shelves. She knows exactly where his father kept the key and since she's given explicit instructions to every servant in the household not to rearrange it; the library remained untouched. It remained how it is since Arthur had last run his fingers through its book cases filled with meticulously organized books in precise cataloguing; Walter being the only person who Integra allows to clean the room.

The volumes, slim and fat alike are bound in old but good-quality leather; the pages are made from waxy parchment, yellowed and dog-eared with age. Half-a dozen all in all and by the looks of it, a couple of centuries old at least. She fancies her great-great grandfather leafing through its pages by the gaslight in front of the fire place in the same room where she is. She could almost hear the crisp crackling of paper as it is being turned.

Sitting by the cold marble floor in the library she started to read.

There might as well be a mighty crush of thunder to come along with the revelation that struck her at that moment for Lo and behold; the books gave her answers to the questions. She didn't even have the need to read a single word written in them at all; all she has to do is to look at illustrations. Pictures or rather drawings in her case do indeed paint a thousand words and the drawings told her all she needed to know.

The mechanics in the procreation of human life; The Wheelbarrow, Dog-style, Suspended Congress, the Butterfly, The Splitting Bamboo.

Integra Hellsing was struck with a mixture of rapt fascination and morbid curiosity as she skimmed through pages and pages of graceful illustrations depicting the various ways a man and a woman might come together…_and mate_. Her mind spinning with the colourful pictures from the pamphlets the doctor gave her of bodily systems situated between the legs of either gender; systems which she hardly knew of its real purpose until that very moment.

Mental flashbacks and memory stills, of the things she thought to have forgotten; others wilfully repressed surged back to her consciousness. They came back to her in a rush and pieces of her limited yet meaningful encounters with the natural word had at that moment, finally made sense.

She thought of her father's mastiffs; fierce and strong hunting dogs, remembering the scene she witnessed among a couple of dogs in the kennel when she was much younger.

She recalls the vague sense of pity she felt for the bitch as Integra watched the stud roughly mounting the creature, despite the fact that back then she didn't even understood the connection of the deed and the arrival of a new litter of puppies several months later; those adorable little balls of fur which she gushingly and delightfully petted.

She could almost hear the wheels in her brain furiously turning as she sits on the cold marble floor of the library in her flannel pyjamas, one of the volumes in her lap. It only took a few seconds for her when she was able to finally figure things out.

At last she was able to piece things together; the illustrations had shed light to the biological concepts, which until that moment she found almost foreign in their strangeness. She no longer found them confusing and everything had finally clicked into place.

Along with her newfound awareness of the whole picture came the feeling of guilt. There was this little voice inside her head telling her that she should not have seen what she saw. At least, not yet. This vague feeling of having erred made her hastily snap the books shut, promptly returning them to the place where they belong; locking the cabinet and replacing the key where she took it.

Guilt dogged Integra until late that night making her unable to sleep. Still wide awake in her bed she reasoned with herself. Yes she was curious and her curiosity made her snoop, that much she is aware of.

But she didn't have the slightest idea about the content of such books, and to think that they have such fancy and exotic sounding titles; The Perfumed Garden, Kama Sutra, Ishinpo and Ars Amatoria.

However if she hasn't herself discovered about those things, who will inform her about it? Integra asked herself. Even when her father was still alive he did not took in his hands to tell her about it, and had instead shoved the task at the hands of a doctor.

A brilliant doctor whose lecture she didn't understood.

Integra was able to fall asleep after midnight; the sight of those drawings burned in the back of her mind.

After the incident Integra had never looked at a man or a woman who she knew is married the same way she did before. The drawings in those books made her aware of a world unbeknownst to her previously; of the cornucopia of physical activities inaccessible to Integra that takes place behind the locked bedroom doors of couples, husbands and wives.

Integra likened that strange-looking appendage between a full-grown male's legs to that of a snake; a territorial snake that grows long and thick then wiggles in and out of that so small a place between a woman's legs. A snake that spits.

She wonders how it feels like; she wonders if it'll hurt.

At times, Integra finds herself thinking about those acts as she looks over some of her soldiers; in ill-timed moments such as when she is listening to Pete Ferguson's reports. Fit as he is, he is already in his late fifties with his balding, grey hair and equally greying beard. She knows he's married, though she hasn't seen the Mrs. Ferguson yet and she wonders if he does to her wife some of the things that she saw in those books.

Integra finds herself thinking about the things the soldier does to her wife when the he is all alone with his missus. In the private recesses of her mind the direction of her thoughts heads towards such way as the soldier informs Integra about the state of her other soldiers and amidst request of supplies.

Other times, the sight of those illustrations intrude on her thoughts as she look at the some of the younger soldiers; a few of the, handsome and a number of them also married.

It is the images of these physical activities which she has no words to call for, that pops out in her mind unexpectedly as she looks at the white, gloved hands with its curiously foreign and ominous looking seals, of the tall and lean black-haired creature she freed from the dungeons not more than three months ago.

Integra is aghast but it is to the said mental images that she finds her thoughts leading to at times she sees him during early evenings; the red clad presence drifting to and fro in her study, in the halls and in the library.

She didn't mind him though, for the colossal mansion where she was born, which she calls her home and which she now solely owns; seemed larger and looming than ever.

And to Integra, unbearably hollow at times; now that her father's gone.

Truth be told she didn't mind. Integra finds him quite pleasing to look at; he has the palest skin she's ever seen; alabaster like and translucent. His facial features are chiselled; the lines in his face strong, masculine and aquiline, not unlike his father.

Despite the fact that such comparison is uncalled for and that she felt quite horrified at the thought.

More often than not when her thoughts drift towards this direction; she finds herself thinking of how his gloved hands would grasp her ankles, her thighs.

How those hands would restrain her thin wrists and how they would feel against her naked skin as they manoeuvre and twist her limbs in the manner Integra had seen in those manuals. Integra feels mortified whenever her mind conjures up these mental images; of her long blond hair spilling over his chest and her coffee-cream skin contrasting sharply with his pale one as they intertwine against each other. Somehow there is a little voice inside her head saying that it is wrong and the sense of having committed wrong, of having erred made her guilty about the heat pooling below her belly.

Now she is working on disciplining herself and wills herself not think about the things she saw on the books. She would have to control her thoughts; she will not think about those drawings at her study, in the library, in the dinner table and especially not while she is in bed for she is a good girl, a good Christian girl.

And she must learn how to answer "I'm fine thank you" while looking steadily at Walter's concerned face or to the knowing look at the vampire's red eyes at times when her thoughts had ran amok to the direction of those drawings and one or the other asks if she is okay amidst the sudden draining of color from her coffee cream skin.

Notes:

Integra is one hell of a lady. Being the orphan that she is, she's gone through puberty without a mother and a father to guide her (that must've been hard) and with an organization which she somehow needs to manage. That said, she somehow managed to grow up into such a fine young woman. In the tv-series, ova and manga her character is impressive; an imposing knight and a charismatic leader. Despite that fact, she is only human and is far from perfect. She must've had her growing pains.

Naughty plot bunny; it smacks me in the face at times when I least expect it.

This fic roughly mirrors some of the experiences I had when I was of the same age.


End file.
